| When Governor Christie announced his budget proposal, he called for "an era of sacrifice". However, it is clear that he means it for those who earn less than $400,000 per year, public employees, non-corporations and isn't a big business.
For starters, Christie talked about a "smaller government", yet his $29.3 billion budget has more spending than former Governor Corzine's last budget, and also kicks the middle class squarely in the teeth. And then, ironically, he defends giving a huge tax cut to those who need it least (go to the 3:15 mark) with a comment on how it would be "putting his foot on the neck of small businesses".
Never mind that he has stuck his foot on the neck, down the throats and up the asses of the entire middle and lower income families in the state with this budget. Cuts to education funding, cuts to public transportation that will lead to a 25%+ fare increases, scaling back the earned income credit for poor families, eliminate the property tax rebates - despite saying it would be "the last thing he ever would do" - and those are just a few of the many.
Of course, this "shared sacrifice" in an era where just about everything else is cut doesn't apply when close to $1 billion per year can be had from reinstating a very popular tax on those who (1) have seen the least pain and (2) can afford it the most.
But what about the other lies? Well, outside of the "never eliminating the property tax rebates" (regardless of whether they should or should not be eliminated), there is the history of Christie making up numbers out of thin air just in these past couple of months - and he has done it again. Christie's supposed $11 billion deficit includes close to $3 billion in pension obligations that he is not funding, and another $1.1 billion in property tax rebates which are being eliminated.
So we are talking about $7 billion - which is still a large number, but not $11 billion - just another Christie lie. Add back the tax on the super rich and that goes down to $6 billion.
Lastly, Christie seems to have replaced the word "taxes" with "fees" - and while our tax dollars go to pay for services like, well, repairs and removal of trees after a devastating storm for example, Christie was very adamant during the campaign about equating "taxes and fees" when hitting Corzine. Yet, here he is proposing "fees" on businesses - but don't call them taxes, of course....
New Jerseyans voted for a change in Governors. However, they will now be waking up with a horrible hangover as to the effects of their vote. |
